


something to be proud about

by SoloByChoice



Category: due South
Genre: Asexual Character, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-07
Updated: 2017-02-07
Packaged: 2018-09-22 14:49:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9612422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoloByChoice/pseuds/SoloByChoice
Summary: Fraser has some good news to tell Vecchio. Set during season 1. The self-indulgent ace Fraser fic I was destined to write.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know how wide-spread the use of asexual as an identity was in the 90s, but I also don't care. I wrote this for me.

Humming to himself cheerfully, Fraser entered the Chicago PD station. He greeted the various officers and civilian workers by name as he headed up the stairs. Some of them greeted him back. He bumped into Elaine just outside the bullpen. It seemed like he was always bumping into her, in the literal sense. He took a small step backwards.

“Good afternoon, Elaine. Is Ray here?”

She sighed. “Yeah, he’s assaulting the coffee machine. Hey Fraser, how come you never come here to see anyone else?”

Fraser wasn’t sure what she was getting at, exactly, but he smiled to be polite. “I come to see everyone, but I have some good news to tell Ray, specifically. I’m happy to see you, of course.”

She rolled her eyes expansively, so he tried smiling slightly wider. Elaine groaned and left. Nonplussed, Fraser shrugged and went to the break room.

There was Ray, as promised, having apparently lost his fight. He was sitting at one of the plastic tables, wearing an extremely loud shirt, and glaring at the offending coffee machine like it had personally insulted his mother. Good old Ray. Fraser felt a surge of affection for his friend.

“Hello, Ray. Do you have five minutes? I’ve got something to tell you.”

Ray sighed heavily. “Yeah, hey, Benny. Sure I got five minutes. I was going to spend my break drinking coffee, but since that damn machine keeps eating my money I guess I’ll just listen to you instead. Coffeeless.”

Fraser stepped over to the machine and regarded it, then carefully inserted an American dollar bill into it.

“Oh sure, it’ll take your money! Of course!”

Fraser handed Ray the coffee and sat down across from him.

Ray blinked, then grinned. “Hey, thanks!” He drank half the cup in one gulp, then frowned. “Wait, since when do you carry actual legal American tender? Or is that thing secretly Canadian?”

“I had some cash left over from this weekend. I was helping out a boy from my building and, among other things, ended up at a coffee shop and –“

Ray held up a hand. “Benny, you know I love hanging out with you instead of doing my job, but I am on kind of a time limit. What’s the thing you wanted to tell me?”

“Ah, right.” Fraser composed his thoughts. This was very good news and he was eager to tell someone, but it was a little bit intimidating when it came down to it. “Ah, well, Ray, as you know, Pride was this weekend. Or, did you know that Pride was this weekend?”

“Sure, it’s a big parade. Wait, are you tryna tell me you’re gay or something?”

“No, but a young man who lives on the floor below mine wanted to go to the parade, and I agreed to accompany him for moral support and potentially physical support as well.  Additionally, I was curious because I’ve never been to any kind of gathering for the queer community before.”

“What, don’t they have queer people in Canada?” asked Ray, apparently unable to resist ribbing him.

Fraser sighed, patiently. “Of course we do, Ray, but.... well there aren’t many people of any sort where I was working last,” he admitted. Ray laughed.

“Anyway, while I was there I met a lot of very interesting people –“

“I’ll bet you did.”

“Ray.”

“Sorry.”

“One of the people I met was a nice young man named Quincey and we had a long discussion about the complicated nature of sexuality.”

“I’ve never thought it was that complicated, you know, once you get past the Catholic Guilt,” said Ray and finished his coffee.

“I’ve always found it to be very complicated, and interesting, but unfortunately the libraries my grandparents worked at never had many well-rounded books on the subject. Even when I was younger I thought the books I did find left out a lot of subtleties. For example, I could never find where I fit in.”

He paused in case Ray wanted to say something to that, but Ray just looked at him.

“During our conversation, I told Quincey this and he suggested several possibilities, and ah, it turns out I’m asexual, Ray.”

“Okay, I’ll bite, what’s that?”

“It means not feeling attracted to anyone, generally. And given that I’m over twice the age at which people are supposed to start developing attraction to people, it seems safe to say it’s not going to happen to me, which is, it turns out, perfectly fine.”

“What about that, what did you call it, that ‘inner ear imbalance’ from way back when?”

“Complicated and... not relevant,” said Fraser, and stared over Ray’s head until the other man shrugged and leaned back to throw his empty cup away.

“I realize this is a lot to drop on you out of nowhere, but I had to tell someone and, well.” Fraser stopped, not wanting to admit the obvious: that Ray was the only person close enough.

“Hey, Benny, it’s fine. It’s great! What do I do now, buy you a beer? I’ve never had anyone come out to me before. C’mon, I’ll buy ya a beer. Or –“ He grimaced at the clock. “Give me like an hour.”

“Sure, Ray, you can buy me a beer,” said Fraser, grinning, as they headed toward Ray’s desk.

“Hey you know, you don’t smile much, Benny, you oughtta smile more.”

“What? I smile plenty.”

“Not like that, you don’t.”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” said Fraser.


End file.
